


Supernatural, Season 7, Episode 23, Survival of the Fittest

by TheSomewhatRamblingReviewer



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Analysis, Episode Review, Episode: s07e23 Survival of the Fittest, Meta, Nonfiction, Season Finale, Season/Series 07, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-22
Updated: 2020-02-22
Packaged: 2021-02-28 02:15:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22842349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSomewhatRamblingReviewer/pseuds/TheSomewhatRamblingReviewer
Summary: Warning: Contains spoilers for the episode and later seasons. Complete.





	Supernatural, Season 7, Episode 23, Survival of the Fittest

Open to Dick trying to make nice with Crowley. Crowley, however, hasn’t gotten over the time Dick commented he (Dick) would rather swim through hot garbage than so much as shake hands with a mutation like Crowley.

Touchy, touchy, Crowley is.

However, they quickly start flirting. Dick believes Crowley has a vial of his own blood stashed away somewhere along with plans for it to be sent to the Winchesters in the event of his death. Likely realising Crowley is the type who can’t be trusted, especially under torture, he wants them to be allies against the Winchesters.

He offers Crowley free reign of Canada on the condition all demons stay out of America. There’s another fat joke I don’t appreciate. In exchange for Canada, Dick wants Crowley to give the Winchesters a vial of lower-level demon blood Dick has acquired and tell them it’s Crowley’s.

Crowley admits he hates the Winchesters. Hw asks if Dick wants the deal in writing as opposed to Crowley’s usual M.O. of sealing the deal with a kiss.

“I don’t kiss on the mouth.”

“Your loss,” Crowley retorts. He withdraws an absurdly large contract and magnifying glass. Heh.

Meanwhile, the brothers are headed somewhere, and Dean makes it clear he thinks their plan is a bad idea.

“Dean, it was your idea,” Sam points out. “And it was the best one either of us had.”

“I said it as a joke.”

Sam answers, though it was a bad joke, it’s a good idea. He suggests they could call Cas again.

Dean isn’t down with this. It turns out, the last time they did, Cas appeared on the car naked and covered in bees.

Sam is grateful he missed this.

They turn on the radio, and it goes on about how Roman enterprises is still rising. The radio continues he’s currently holed up at his offices.

There’s a scene of Bobby in the maid’s body. He sees an interview Dick gave/is giving on a public TV.

Back to D&C, they’re still going over the deals of the contract, and I always find it funny when the preternatural have to hash through bureaucracy.

At a tomb, the Winchesters are deciding which nun’s corpse they want to steal from in order to fill the bone of a righteous person requirement. They read about several, and Dean decides on Sister Mary Constant.

Going back to D&C, they’re finished negotiating the contract. Dick calls his assistant, Susan, to tell her to make triplicates of the absurdly long contract and summon a notary. I’m assuming said notary won’t be a typical, run-of-the mill human.

Elsewhere, the brothers try to summon Crowley, but since he’s under Dick’s devil trap, he can’t appear, even though he’d usually have no choice in the matter. Sam thinks Crowley might be in trouble, but Dean simply says, “If Crowley wants to screw you, he’ll screw you.”

There’s a knock on the door, and coming in, Meg complains about Cas zapping her to them without warning. Dean asks why, and her response is, “Go ask him. He was your boyfriend, first.”

He does not respond she got more boyfriend-like action than he ever did. Instead, he goes out to where Cas is sitting in a car, visibly steels him with patience, and asks, “So, Cas. what’s, uh, what’s the word?”

Cas doesn’t approve of cosmetic testing on monkeys. He asks how important lipstick is to Dean.

“Not very,” Dean answers. “You want to come inside, and uh, tell us what’s going on?”

Inside, Cas stresses he doesn’t participate in aggressive activities. Picking up the bone to smell it, he comments, “Mmh. Sister Mary Constant. Good choice.”

Dean asks why Cas brought Meg to them.

Cas explains he wanted to observe the flowers, and fruit, but obviously, flowers come first, but the flowers were quiet. Eventually, he checked on the garrison guarding Kevin, and if any of them are still alive, they must be in hiding.

When asked where Kevin is, Cas realises he could steal the monkeys from their cages, but this poses the problem of where he’d put them.

Dean claps his hands. “Hey, focus. Is Kevin alive?”

“I don’t want to fight!”

Forcing himself to be calm, Dean explains, “We’re worried.”

Cas explains “they” took Kevin, but he’s still alive. In addition, since Cas has told them, he’s no longer responsible. Before Dean can properly protest, Meg notices the summoning stuff and tries to bail. Crowley appears before she can.

He threatens Meg, and this causes Cas to regain some of his fighting spirit. Then, he asks why Cas isn’t dead, and Cas answers he doesn’t know. Crowley asks if Cas wants to be with the offer he could help in this regard, and Dean does not take kindly to this.

Meg is sarcastic over the fact Crowley isn’t happy about them harbouring an angel, especially the one he hates more than them.

Jeez, all Crowley needs to do is threaten/insult Dean, and assuming this is still a sore spot for Sam, everyone in the room will be ready to do battle with him.

As it is, Crowley wants a confrontation with Cas, but acknowledging he’s still honing his communication skills, Cas babbles about not going to heaven due to the lack of insects before offering Crowley a bag of honey as a token.

After a long look with Dean, Crowley grumps about how he’d like to deal with old grudges and take down Dick both, but he doesn’t see the fun in destroying an insane angel. He tells them to text him when Cas regains his sanity, and I’m sure he believes they’ll do this just as much as the audience does. Giving them a vial of blood, he acknowledges they can’t trust him.

Then, he threatens Meg. Cas moves towards him, but he clarifies he means later. “Cas can have you for now. Hilariously, it seems he’d be upset at losing you. And the boys need Cas to get Dick.”

If this is an entendre, it only possibly applies to Dean.

Cas protests he doesn’t fight anymore.

Insisting Cas is vital, Crowley tosses the blood to Sam before disappearing.

Meanwhile, Bobby accidentally has the maid touch iron, and despite her pleas, protests, and attempts at running, he repossesses her.

Elsewhere, Dick talks to Susan. He asks her if he looks like a fool.

“Not in that particular body.”

Susan is awesome.

He tells her there are three rules to contract negotiation: Bring breath mints, get it in writing, and have a plan for when the other party screws you. He orders her to go get an arm from the fridge.

Over to Kevin, he’s in a locked room. A scientist leads a girl in, and talking to her as if she were a dog, he orders her to sit and stay. Once he’s gone, Kevin tries to talk to her, but she’s extremely vague, literal, and doesn’t seem to have any perception of herself or her surroundings.

Back to the brothers and company, Sam and Dean wonder if they can trust Crowley in this instance, come to no conclusion, and pour the blood over the bone. Appearing, Cas offers them both a sandwich. He assures them he went to special care to make sure all the ingredients were safe and comforted the pig before slaughtering it to make the ham. “You need your strength,” he tells Dean.

Sam is unimpressed, because, he thinks Cas can do more for his brother, and by extension, him, in this instance.

In addition, once a person does something as big as rebelling against heaven, well, they’ve set expectations high. Suddenly, burgers, making them laugh, and refraining from calling their lover’s brother an abomination just isn’t going to cut it.

Therefore, Sam asks why Crowley seemed so sure Cas was needed, and Cas insists Crowley was wrong. He asks Sam to please accept the sandwich as a gesture of solidarity.

At Roman Enterprises, Susan delivers the real Dick’s arm to her boss, and he tells her to gather the security detail.

Back to Kevin, the scientist from earlier delivers a change of clothes for the spacey girl. When she’s undressing, Kevin looks away. He notices part of the outfit involves hair clips. Whose bright idea was this?

There’s a scene of men arriving to greet Dick.

In the room, the spacey girl is redressed sans one hairclip. I imagine Kevin was the one who put her hair behind her ear. The scientist delivers a meal for Kevin, but Kevin claims to be vegan. The scientist and spacey girl leave, and Kevin starts working on the lock with the hairclip.

Over to the boardroom, Dick notes the last time all those in attendance were together was while inside Cas. He urges them to enjoy the sushi made from fresh orphans.

If he’d been nicer to Crowley, he probably could have topped it off with some more nice baby uvula cupcakes. I imagine Crowley’s a decent cook.

Next, Dick leads a meeting on how they’re best going to turn America into a slaughterhouse, and Kevin listens. He tries to leave the building but is caught by Susan. She inquires, “Why are you out of your cage, mouse?”

In the boardroom, Dick brings the spacey girl up to the front of the room.

Outside the building, the brothers use the help Charlie left behind to hack into the security cameras. Weirdly, in the boardroom, the spacey girl doesn’t appear on camera. Even more weirdly, to them, they see various Dick Romans in different parts of the building.

Back in the boardroom, Dick has the spacey girl take off her dress as he explains they’ve developed a poison to kill off slim people. He demonstrates on her. In addition, the poison will target short people, haemophilic individuals, and people with an IQ greater than 150.

This is stupid, and it would never work.

For one, IQ is socially constructed rather than a biological reality. To a degree, intelligence _can_ be measured, but IQ tests are a poor way to do it.

Now, maybe, certain atypical markers of the brain could be recognised and targeted, but those things don’t necessarily indicate what intelligence levels are.

Moreover, I’m not sure how well it would work against the others. A person can be on medication or dieting and temporarily have a low body mass, but if there genetic markers are looked at, they’ll read as having a naturally higher one. If a haemophilic individual is on certain medications (I don’t know if such medications exist), it could potentially fool the poison into reading the individual as non. When it comes height, this might not work properly when given to anyone under their mid-twenties.

I don’t know, it could be he means there’s a plan in place to only dispense the poison to people specifically targeted and ensure those not aren’t brought into contact with it, but if so, this should have been laid out better.

Moving on, Dick dismisses the meeting.

Outside, Sam sees the Bobby-possessed maid, remembers seeing her before, and realises what Bobby’s done. Telling Dean, he insists Dean wait in the car.

Sam begs Bobby to stop. He points out Bobby will likely get the maid killed, and even if he doesn’t, there are cameras everywhere, and she’ll be the one to suffer. Bobby doesn’t care, and when Sam tries to physically stop him, he starts choking Sam until he sees his reflection and realises what exactly he’s doing. He leaves the maid, and Sam carries her away.

The next scene has Sam hanging up the phone. He informs the others the maid is fine and will be out of the hospital soon. Cas is glad and offers a sandwich. Dean looks down at the flask. Meg wants to know why they stopped their pursuit in order to help the maid.

Sam explains about the numerous Dick Romans running about. Cas starts twitching, and, of course, Dean notices right away.

Cas thinks they should get a cat.

I imagine he’d probably prefer one who didn’t verbally insult him behind his back.

Dean is unimpressed, and when Cas makes it clear the issue is he’s not going to get involved because he’s afraid of destroying everything again rather than a literal inability to be of help, Dean’s patience is shot. He says they don’t care what Cas did or how badly Cas is handling what he did, they need help, and Cas owes it to them to do so.

As usual, what Dean says and what I think he actually means are two different things.

In response, Cas suggests they play Twister before disappearing.

Meg is sarcastic in laying out: Cas can distinguish the real Dick from the fakes due to his angelic abilities plus the fact the Leviathans were once inside him.

Cas reappears with a Twister game. Thankfully, it’s this rather than an actual twister.

Later, Bobby appears, and he fusses at them for not burning the flask. Then, he acknowledges trying to kill Sam was a wakeup call. He tells them to go after Dick for justice rather than revenge. He also advises them, when they die, don’t hang around.

They start a fire, and as best he can, he tells them he loves them by saying, “Here’s to- running into you guys on the other side. Only- not- too soon, alright?”

Jared and Jensen both do an excellent job, especially the latter. Without saying a word, Dean hesitates but tosses the flask in, and then, they both watch as Bobby disappears.

There’s a reveal Cas was watching.

Later, Cas is playing game, and Dean comes over. “Cas, I need a wingman.”

“Dean,” Cas warns.

Dean says this isn’t about Cas helping with Dick Roman situation. All Dean’s asking for right now is angelic transportation.

They go to where the Impala’s stashed. Cas starts to say something, but Dean interrupts. He’s accepted Cas’s conscientious objection.

Cas asks if Sam and Dean will die heroically if they fail, and confused, Dean answers, “I don’t know. I guess.”

Cas says, at best, he dies trying to fix his own stupid mistakes. Alternatively, he doesn’t die. He reveals he’s decided the resurrections are punishments.

Dean is even more confused than ever. He asks if they’re on the subject of God.

“I’m not good luck, Dean.”

In response, Dean says, since Cas is their biggest hope, he’d rather have him than not even if he’s currently going through some deep issue. He points out they all have issues.

This causes Cas to smile without actually fully smiling.

Dean asks, “What?”

“I don’t want to make you uncomfortable. But I detect a note of forgiveness.”

Trying to brush it off, Dean says, “Yeah, well, probably going to die tomorrow. So.”

“Well, I’ll go with you.”

Taking a minute out, I don’t know if any of what I think was intended, but not everything is as it seems.

Cas decided before he came back he was going to help, although, it was something he struggled greatly with and tried desperately to find a way to change his own mind about. He could have called, left a note, etc., in regards to Kevin, but he came. He never fully disappeared, and a few times, there were hints he was prodding them to keep pushing.

This is why he brought Meg.

If she goes into battle, he’s going, too. She was his caretaker, his protector, his friend, and she understands loyalty just as he does. When the time comes, he’s going to protect her, take care of her, and help her as a friend would. This includes helping her do a solid for the Winchesters so that they’ll help her take down Crowley.

If he goes into battle, she’s going, too. Her responsibility and affection towards him didn’t stop when they left the hospital.

They both decided they’d lay low instead of getting involved, but he knew it wouldn’t work for either of them. She’s not going to be safe or truly happy until Crowley’s gone. He’s not going to be able to live if Dean goes into battle and dies without him (Cas) there with him (Dean).

He heard Bobby tell them to go after Dick Roman for the right reasons, and this briefly gave him another reprieve. Was he doing it for the right reasons? After all, he thought working with Crowley was for the greater good, and he thought what he was doing when he was playing God was the necessary thing to build a better world.

Now, though, Dean could have used his forgiveness as an incentive, ‘I’ll forgive you if you do this,’ or, ‘I’ve forgiven you, making you obligated,’ but he doesn’t. He simply says he’s going to die, and it costs nothing to give the forgiveness but means a lot to Cas. A gift, then; no conditions.

Of course, I think Dean forgave Cas a long time ago. He’s just either never felt the need to say it or didn’t know how. Maybe he thought Cas already knew, or maybe he didn’t. Either way, when Cas brings it up, he uses the opportunity to let Cas know, and knowing this, Cas is no longer at war.

Some part of him has probably been telling himself he can live without closure. If Dean dies without forgiving him, he’ll manage. Maybe some part of him thinks he’d deserve it.

However, he now knows Dean has forgiven him. This doesn’t necessarily mean Dean fully trusts him, but it leaves the possibility Dean could. If they survive, maybe, he can get better, and maybe, he can be Dean’s most trusted ally again.

Cas asks what the plan is.

The answer is they’re going to announce themselves- big.

The next scene is of the Impala going down the road as Born to Be Wild plays. Awesome. It crashes into the sign at Roman enterprises, and getting out, Meg starts taking out Leviathan via Borax and decapitation.

Unfortunately, she’s captured by other demons.

Meanwhile, Sam is by himself, and Cas and Dean are together. The three sneak into the building. Sam finds a bound-and-gagged Kevin, and upon being freed, Kevin insists on blowing up the lab so that people won’t be killed off.

In the lab, Dean and Cas stab Dick just as Sam and Kevin appear. He explodes, and Cas and Dean disappear along with him.

Then, Crowley appears, takes Kevin, and disappears. Sam is left completely alone with no idea how to find the others.

In a dark forest, Dean is asleep on the ground. Cas orders, “Wake up.” He explains they’re in Purgatory, and it’s full of monsters who will hunt them. There’s a growl, and Dean turns to see red, glowy eyes. He turns to tell Cas they need to run but finds Cas gone.

The last shot is Dean alone in the dark forest with vague, moving shadows in the distance.

Fin.


End file.
